New, Exciting and Unfortunate Things

I’m trying to remember what kept me from even saying “Hi!” here on my blabbering world for quite a while and I realized it’s because a lot has happened to me, to the kids and around me that I could no longer catch up.

So while I was “away” trying to figure out what’s going on, this happened.

No, that’s not a seahorse! That was my hair! 🙂

And the owner of that unruly wavy hair had the guts to take a selfie to show her new look! 😀

Guess how many shots I took to make a successful selfie attempt? I’m always a newbie! 😀

Apart from my new short hair, I’m also braces-free now! Yipee! 🙂 I’m on retainers stage for I don’t know how long.

Okay, enough of vanity. 😀

All the playfulness aside, I personally went through some, let’s say, introspection and reflection I wish I could find the words to put together to tell about. I’ll try to find the words when I find the time. Haha! But for now, I decided to announce my come-back from “unintentional” blogging hiatus with some updates about my adorable sweeties. 🙂 It wouldn’t be about me, fortunately. 😀

If you have, by any chance, visited this blog in the past and out of boredom or curiosity tried to take peek into it again, you may have noticed that I blurred the photos of my kids. I went through the tedious process of checking all my posts one by one and replacing all of my children’s photos with Gausian-blurred ones. Why?

For security reasons. One of the keyword searches that drove traffic to this blog for a couple of days even weeks is mommy8. It was a puzzle in my head:  why would a file name of a photo that I included in one of my posts appear in my keyword search? So out of curiosity, I googled it and got shocked and annoyed at the same time when I found out that it has something to do with XXX! My goodness!

You know, I’m trying to maintain a wholesome blog here and all of a sudden I would get visits from people who have carnal intentions. Scary. My thought wandered. Then I panicked! My kids! They’d get to see my kids! What if they do something sick with my kids’ photos?!  Then some more paranoiac thoughts followed. What if they stalk my kids and kidnap them?!  God forbid please.

So I spent night after night editing photos of my 2 innocent yet spirited children that I have already posted to save them from potential harm from the internet. I know I should’ve done that before. I should’ve trusted my guts to not post any picture of them but I was thinking then, “no one gets to read this blog anyway.” What was in my mind, huh? It’s the world wide web for Pete’s sake and I didn’t even set my blog into private so somewhere, somehow, someone would stumble upon this online dumpsite of my thoughts and experiences. Pffft. Anyhow, at least I’ve done some preventive action. 😀

Moving on to happy thoughts now. 🙂

The Big Boy has been back to school as a Kindergartener for more than 3 weeks now and so far he’s doing good. He has adjusted to going to school and seeing new teachers and classmates except…waking up early in the morning. 😀

He mutters in droopy eyes that refuse to open, “Antok ako”  (or if he’s in English mode, “I’m sleepy”) and covers his face with a pillow. He’s like this 50% of the time so he comes to school late most of the time.

Other than his tantrums obviously due to his interrupted sleep, he’s excited to go to school.  And what makes him excited?  He gets to drag his Lighting McQueen “suitcase bag” (trolley bag) with his matching McQueen lunchbox inside. 😀

He really likes pulling his “suitcase bag” 😀

And he gets home enthusiastic with what they did in school.

ME: What did you do in school?

BIG BOY: I ate my snacks!

I knew it! That’s his favorite part of schooling! Hahaha! Who doesn’t like snacktime? 😀 At least he eats the baon I prepare. Hehe! Don’t worry, there’s normally a follow-up answer.

BIG BOY:  Then I color[ed] the butterfly and paste[d] it on the board. 

Or whatever activity they did for the day. 🙂 But snacktime is usually the highlight. 😀

Of course, days before his back-to-school, I spent a few late nights labeling and covering his school supplies, notebooks and books. The duties of a mom with a school kid, and this will double once the Little Princess has become a school kid, too. 😀  Anyhow, my life was made easier by the Time Saver plastic cover cut into book size that I discovered in National Bookstore and by recycling the Big Boy’s school labels last year which I designed myself and printed on sticker paper.

But before his school started, we brought the Big Boy to our dentist  Doc M to get dental fillings for his molars. His molars have already developed cavities and whenever he sees his tooth decays in the mirror, the Big Boy always tells me to visit Doc M and have his teeth fixed. “Mommy, sira na teeth ko. Let’s go to the dentist.”

According to Doc M, molar teeth regenerate at age 13 or 14 so it would be better to have his 4 molar teeth filled to avoid toothaches. So we decided to proceed with the procedure.

The Big Boy readily sat on the dental chair and followed Doc M’s instructions. The drilling began and our pretty dentist was amazed at how behaved the Big Boy was. She mentioned she normally does not drill young children’s teeth because kids tend to move a lot or get impatient but the Big Boy did it! 🙂 Right after his procedure, the Big Boy ran to the dentist’s box of toy treats for her kid patients and got an airplane toy. He already knows the drill! 😀

I’m happy that the Big Boy gets to appreciate the importance of dental visits at a young age and he gets comfortable going to the dentist. Because we still need to go back for the other 2 molars! 😀

Now, while exciting things take place for the Big Boy, our Little Princess went through some ordeal!

One fine Friday afternoon about two weeks ago, the Little Princess was playing at the playground with her Daddy (who was on leave from work) and Kuya. She was climbing the stairs to the slide when she slipped and her nose bridge hit the edge of the wood! My poor Little Princess! 😦 I was at the office when I received a call from hubby telling me, in a broken voice, what happened and that he was going to bring her cutie lady to the hospital to be checked because her nose bridge swelled up. He assured that the Little Princess was no longer crying but he wanted to have her checked by the doctor to be sure because it was a delicate part of her body that was hit.

I left work and followed them quickly to the hospital. Thankfully, the Little Princess was her usual lively self when I saw them at the ER. And barefoot. 😀 People at home probably forgot to pick up her shoes out of panic.

The Little Princess was examined by the pediatrician, her wound cleaned and iced (slightly because she didn’t like being pressed with an icepack on her face) then she cried and an x-ray test was performed on her facial area (where she cried again) to ensure she had no fracture as the pedia confirmed that the nasal area is a very sensitive part of our body. An EENT doctor assessed her (where she again cried) after the x-ray results were out and thank God, no fracture was seen. We were just given some instructions and medications for the Little Princess and after like forever, we were discharged. And the crying stopped except when we she didn’t get what she wanted like playing with the hospital stuff.

She was happy when the doctor announced she had no fracture! 😀 (Apparently, the bruise on her nose also got blurred 😀 )

Just a side story: while we were waiting in the ER, the Little Princess of course became hungry and had to nurse from me. I realized it was already dinner time so she latched and latched and latched. Another pediatrician noticed her breastfeeding while we were waiting for them to discharge us and gave this encouraging remark, “Very good, Mommy. Keep it up”. It made me smile giddily. 😀 Because for the first time in 2 years  that we have been breastfeeding, I received a positive feedback about our breastfeeding from a stranger. I normally get a quiet gaze, sometimes with laughter, whenever we breastfeed in public.

Another untoward though funny incident happened on Father’s Day. We went out and brought the kids to a play place at the mall then had a Japanese dinner after. Come dessert time, I ordered a green tea ice cream which the Little Princess liked a lot. She noshed on a spoonful of ice cream then some more, one after another. After getting satisfaction from the green tea ice cream, she walked back and forth the aisle until I noticed a brown thingy on her legs and socks. The green tea turned brown and leaked from her cloth diaper, some even spilled on the floor! Sorry, TMI. Haha! 😀

So I rushed the Little Princess to the washroom and cleaned her up. Thanks to the restaurant crew who was kind enough to offer me lots of bathroom tissue. And for wetbags too, where all her stained cloth diaper, skirt and socks went sealed.

I bet you would rather see this than what happened to the Little Princess on Father’s Day. 😀 Btw, this figurine was our gift for Daddy J together with some other stuff 🙂

That’s not the end of it all. Five days after, the Little Princess caught fever which prompted me, as usual, to take that day off from work to monitor her for weakness, loss of appetite, rashes, etc. I don’t want to rely on the yaya when any of my kids is sick. The Little Princess’ fever went to us high as 39 degrees Celsius and lasted only for one day.

The following day though, rashes sprouted at the Little Princess’ arms, hands, legs and feet. I dismissed that it’s Roseola because she has already acquired it in the past so off we went to her pediatrician for check up. The diagnosis — Hand Foot and Mouth Disease (HFMD). It’s a viral infection common among young children that produces sores in the mouth and rashes in the skin specifically the hands and the feet. It made more sense to me why the Little Princess breastfed almost all day while she was sick.

The onset of rashes on the Little Princess’ arms. It spread to her body, back, thighs and even her nape. Poor little girl! 😦

I’m familiar with HMFD (not because I’ve read about it online 😀 ) because the Big Boy caught this virus on his 1st birthday party and I also acquired it after sharing a frozen yogurt with him. Though I’m obviously no longer a child, the doctor explained that I probably didn’t get the virus when I was younger that’s why it was transmitted to me now that I’m an adult. I’m telling you, it was terrible to get an HMFD because of the sores and rashes which makes it difficult to eat and walk.

So where did the Little Princess get the virus? We’re quite sure it was at the play place we visited on Father’s Day because the place was full of potential carriers aka kids. Well, that’s part of being a kid. 😉 They have to go out and get exposed to their surroundings (and viruses as well 😀 ) every once in a while. We cannot just leave them trapped at home like Rapunzel. Thank God, at least her fever wasn’t dengue. 🙂

Thankfully, the Little Princess is doing well now — no more rashes and back to her energetic state (though it seemed that her sickness didn’t even affect her energy level 😀 ). But we’re not bringing her out yet because she might transmit the virus to other people or get a new virus this time. It’s already sickness season.

There. I guess this pretty sums up what “has been” recently or at least the past three weeks. Another three weeks for my next post? Nope. It’s hard to catch up! Haha! 🙂